Rumors Say BlackBerry BlackPad Might Run on Android

The BlackBerry rumors have grown even crazier than the Apple rumors, and this one is pretty far-fetched. Research In Motion (RIM) may ship it’s still unannounced BlackBerry ‘BlackPad’ with Android as the operating system. The news comes from a document discovered yesterday in Chinese and a Chinese tech news story. I managed to run them by someone I know who actually reads Chinese (probably should have done that in the first place) and the document states that Quanta is building RIM’s Blackpad, that it will be running Android, and that it will come out in the 11th month (November). While the November date might also just mean when Quanta is ready to ship the BlackPad, it certainly shows that RIM is gearing up for some real battle in the tablet arena.

Your rumor appetite whetted enough? Consider the fact that there have been rumors circulating for months now that the BlackBerry Tablet (also codenamed the ‘Cobalt’) would not be running BlackBerry OS 6. This provides the first actual evidence of what this other operating system would be.

Android on a BlackBerry though? That certainly would be a major break from tradition at RIM. Is the company thinking that it will not have an operating system ready for the tablet in enough time to avoid being left in the dust by everyone else hoping to snag some of the profits from Apple’s iPad? How are BlackBerry users going to adapt to having to use Android on their tablet but BlackBerry OS on their smartphone? Remember, the tablet will supposedly have to tether to a BlackBerry smartphone via Bluetooth to go on the internet when Wi-Fi is unavailable.

So there you have it. If this crazy rumor is true, we might be seeing the BlackPad before the end of the year, sporting Android as the operating system and hoping to stop everyone else’s tablet sales in their tracks. Sound off and let me know if you think these documents are real, or just rumors.

If they use android, they won’t be much different from the rest of the competition. The fact that you’d have to tether to connect to the net would be a disadvantage since that means you absolutely must have a blackberry for the device to be able to connect on 3g.